Welcome!


This day will be a day of technology-related skill building, exploration of materials and resources, and sharing ideas and products you create.

Sharing. As you share today, think about the following questions:
  • What have you discovered?
  • What have you created?
  • How will you use it and why?
  • What will you do next?

And speaking of sharing - you are invited to add your ideas and resources! We are going to do that through an open Google Doc.


A. Getting Started

  • How do your children learn?
  • When do you see sparks of learning and excitement in them?
  • What would YOU like to be able to do that you currently cannot do?


B. Productivity with Images


What products do you create that use images and/or clip art?
How do you insert graphics?
How do you resize graphics?

C. Creating products in various authoring environments

Use one of the environments below to create a product that you can use with the children, or, perhaps one that can serve as a model for the children to create.
  • image editing and special effects (example, adding words and letters to images - literacy)
    • Aviary education is a web-based editing environment for photos, audio, graphics
    • befunkyhas basic editing and photo effects, text, speech bubbles, etc.
    • fd's Flickr Toys Big Huge Labs to add special effects to the photos you have stored at Flickr or ones you upload directly (requires users to create an account to upload own media)
    • Dumpr to turn photos into coloring book images, make them look old, turn them into globes, cubes, etc
    • Picnikis a web-based photo editor




D. Discovery: Exploring websites for educators and students

Do you just send students to a site to explore, or, do you have a purpose in mind?
Did you know? You can add a shortcut to the computer desktop that will take students to a specific webpage - making it easier to use web-based activities.





Want to do more and learn more about technology?
Check out the 21 Things for 21st Century Educators professional development sequence.